Thunder!

While chillaxing at the dining room table with a friend last night, the wind suddenly kicked up, the sky took on a dark cast. Shortly after I pleaded for some real thunder... we had one moderate rumble of thunder! The first real thunder I've heard in Oregon in the nearly four years we've been here. (If you can't tell if it was thunder or a truck going down the street, it doesn't count.)

There are some things I miss about the midwest. Growing up there certainly gave me my chops in relation to inclement weather. Spring thunderstorms would rattle the house for hours--with lightning striking the fields all around the house, winds that would rip limbs from trees and push everything from your lawn into your neighbor's (repeat on down the line). Not to mention the watchful eye always kept torward the cast of the sky. When the greenish-yellow hue permated, you watched the sky for funnel clouds.

Once while having a family reunion in Sullivan, Indiana, a tornado went through the same city park where we were gathered.

You get used to it.

While I'm glad to live in an area free of flood, hurricane, tornado or tsunami, I do miss the thunderstorms.

But even I'd still be scared if I saw this:

Check out FloridaLightning.com for some awesome severe weather photography. (I just happened upon the site while looking for thunderstorm pics.)